Newspapers / The Roanoke Beacon and … / Feb. 1, 1917, edition 1 / Page 3
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A iONETL. TREXDEACrt t T , TLLU5TWI02S3 PARKER CHAPTER XXV Continued. 15 lie did struggle half-heartedly against his first drink, but after he had taken it aad after other drinks bad one the way of the first, he met a number of people whom he liked and "to whom he was inspired to show his liking, and, strange to say, the more "he drank the more of, such friends he discovered. By late afternoon he was In a fantastically Jubilant mood, and. seizing Kurtz, he bore him across the way to Delmonico's. Now, Kurtz was worldly and there fore tolerant. He bad grown to like and to understand his young associate very well indeed, and something about Bob's riotous disposition to gladness .wnlro st rpsnnnm In th Httl tn!!rr It was that expansive and expensive !hour of the afternoon when business worries are dropped and before social cares are shouldered. It was cocktail time along the avenue, the hour when sprees are born and engagements bro ken, and as it lengthened Wharton cele brated it as in days gone by. His last regret had vanished; he was hav ing a splendid time, when a page called Hie to a telephone booth. Adoree's voice greeted him; she was speaking from his own home, and her first words almost sobered him. Some thing was wrong; Bob was needed quickly; Lorelei was asking for him. For more than an hour they had been vainly trying to locate him. They had succeeded In reaching the doctor, and lie was there with a nurse. Adoree's voice broke Lorelei was frightened and so was the speaker. Bob had bet ter waste no time. When Bob lurched out of the booth he was white; the noisy group he had left rose in alarm at sight of his stricken face. His legs led him a crooked course out of the cafe, bring ing him into collision with chairs and tables and causing him to realize for the first time how far he had allowed ilmself to go. In a shaking voice he called for a taxicab, meanwhile allow ing the raw air of the street to cool his head. The terror of the unknown was upon him. But regrets were unavailing. "'.Something had gone wrong, and Lore lei needed him. She was calling for him and he was drunk. He would reel up to her bed of pain with bleared eyes, with poisoned lips, now could he kiss her? How could he explain? The cab swung into the curb, and he scrambled out, then stumbled blind ly up the steps and into the building where he lived. Adoree met him at his own door. -Wharton's Impression was vague; he" saw little more than the tragic widen ing of the girl's eyes as she recognized his condition. "Am I as bad as that?" he stam mered. "Do you.hink she'll notice it?" "Oh, Bob!" Adoree cried, In a strick en voice. "How could you at this time?" "You said she wanted me. I couldn't take time " "Yes! She has been calling for yon, hut I'm sorry I found you." A silent-footed figure in a nurse's uniform emerged from the dining room, and her first expression of relief at sight of. Bob changed swiftly to a stare of startled wonderment. Bob was not too drunk to read the half-spoken pro test on her Hps. Then he heard his wife calling him, and realized that somehow she knew of his coming. At the sound of her voice, strangely throaty, and hoarse from pain, the strength ran out of his body. The doctor heard hlra fumbling at the bed room door and admitted him; then a low, aching cry of disappointment sounded, and Adoree Demorest bowed her head upon her arms.. When Bob groped his way back into the living room his look was ghastly; his face was damp; his eyes were des perate. "She sent me away," he whispered. "Poor thing'." He winced at Ado ree's tone. "God! I heard her -when she saw you. I wonder if you real ize" "Oh, yes," he nodded, slowly. "I don't get drunk all over, like most men. I'm afraid I'll never forget that cry." He was trembling, and his terror was sn nlHful that Adnrpft Inld a comnas- fcsionate hand upon his shoulder. "Don't let go, Bob. Hold your thoughts steady and sober up. We must all 'help." Darkness found Bob huddled In his chair, fighting for his senses, but as the liquor died in him terrible fancies came to life. A frightened maid began preparations for his dinner, but he ordered her away. Then when she brought him a tray, anger at the thought that his own comfort should be considered of consequence made him refuse to touch it. At length his inactivity became un bearable, and, feeling the desperate need of sane counsel, he telephoned John Merkle. Bob was too deeply agi tated to more than note the banker's statement that Mr. and Mrs. Hannibal Wharton ware in the city, but, recall ing it later, he experienced a stab of regret that his mother was not here to comfort Lorelei in the first great crisis of her womanhood. It had been Lore lei's wish that her own mother be kept OF NEW YORKT UFE$ in ignorance of the truth, and now, therefore, the girl had no one to lean upon except an unpractical stage woman and a drunken husband. In Bob's mind the pity of it grew as the time crept on. But Adoree Demorest was wonder ful. Despite her inexperience, she was calm, capable, sympathetic, and, best of all, her normality afforded a sup port upon which both the husband and the wife could rest. When she finally made herself ready for the street Bob cried plteously: "You're not going to leave us?" "I must. It's nearly theater-time," she told him. "It's one of Che penal ties of this business that nothing must hold the curtain; but I'll be back the minute the show Is over. "Lorelei needs you." Adoree nodded; her eyes met Bob's squarely, and he saw that they were wet. Her face was tender, and she appeared very simple and womanly at this moment. Her absurd theatrical ism was gone; she was a natural, unaf fected young woman. . "I wish I could do something to help." wearily continued Bob, but Adoree shook her head so violently that the barbaric beaded festoon beneath her chin clicked and rattled. "Sne knows you're close by; that's enough. This is a poor time to preach, but it seems to me If you've got a bit "She Sent Me Away," He Whispered. of real manhood In you, Bob, you'll never drink again. The shock of see ing you like this when she needed you didn't help her any." "I know! I know!" The words were wrung from him like a groan. "But the thing is bigger and stronger than I am. It takes both of us together to fight it. If she should leave me, I'd never pull through and I wouldn't want to." Never until she left Lorelei's house and turned toward the white lights of Broadway did Adoree Demorest fully realize whither her theatrical career had carried her. Adoree knew herself to be pure. But the world considered her evil, and evil in its eyes she would remain. At this moment she would gladly have changed places with that other girl whose life hung in the scales. John Merkle had never lost interest in Lorelei, nor forgotten her refusal of his well-meant offer of assistance. It pleased him to read into her char acter beauties and nobilities of which she was utterly unconscious If not ac tually devoid. Soon after his talk with Bob he telephoned Hannibal Wharton, making known the situation in the most disagreeable and biting manner of which he was capable. Strange to say, Wharton heard him through, then thanked him before ringing off. When Hannibal had repeated the news to his wife, she moved slowly to a window and stood there staring down into the glittering chasm of Fifth ave nue. Bob's mother was a frail, erect, Impassive woman, wearied and sad dened with the weight of her husband's mililons. There had been a time when society knew her, but of late years she saw few people, and her name was seldom mentioned except in connection with her benefactions. Hannibal Whar ton was serenely conscious of her com plete accord with his every action, and in reporting Merkle's conversation he spoke musingly, as a man speaks to himself. "John loves to be caustic; he likes to vocalize his dyspepsia," the old man muttered. Mrs. Wharton did not stir; there was something uncompromising In the rigid lines of her back and in her stiffly poised head. 'Teople of her kind always have children," he con tinued, "and that's what I told Bob. I told him he was laying up trouble for himself." "Bob had more to him than we j thought," irrelevantly murmured the mother. Si "More than we thought?" nannl bal shook his head. "Not more thari I thought. I knew he had It In him; you were the one " "No. no! We both doubted. Perhaps this girl read him." "Sure she read him!" snorted the father. "She read his bank book. But I fooled her." "Do you remember when Bob was born? The doctors thought " "Of course I remember!" her hus band broke in. "Those doctors said you'd never come through it." "Yes; I wasn't strong." "But you did. I was with you. I fought for you. I wouldn't let you die. Remember it?" The speaker moistened his lips. "Why, I never forgot." "Bob is experiencing something like that tonight." , Hannibal started, then he fumbled uncertainly for a cigar. When he had it lighted he said, gruffly, "Well, it made a man of me; I hope it'll help Bob." Still staring out across the glowing lights and the mysterious, inky biota that lay below her, Mrs. Wharton went on: "You are thinking only of Bob, but I'm thinking of her. too. She is offer ing her life for the life of a little child, just as I offered mine." There was a silence, then Hannibal looked up to find his wife standing over him, with face strangely humble. Her eyes were appealing, her frail fig ure was shaking wretchedly. "My dear!" he cried, rising. "I can't keep it up, Hannibal. I can't pretend any longer. It's Bob's baby and it's ours " Disregarding his denial, she ran on. swiftly: "You can't understand, but I'm lonely, Han nibal, terribly lonely and sad. Bob grew up and went away, and all we had left was money. The dollars piled up; year by year they grew heavier and heavier until they squeezed our lives dry and crowded out everything. They even crowded out our son and spoiled him. They made you Into a stone man; they came between me and the people and the things I loved; they walled me off from the world. My life is empty empty. I want to mother something." Hannibal inquired, hoarsely: "Not this baby, surely? Not that woman's child?" "It's Bob's baby and ours." He looked down at her queerly for a moment. "The breed is rotten. If he had married a decent girl " "John Merkle says she is splendid." "How do you know?" "I have talked with him. I have learned whatever I could about her, wherever I could, and it's all good. After all, Bob loves her, and isn't that enough ?" "But she doesn't love him," stormed the father. "She said she didn't. She wants his money, and she thinks she'll get it this way." "Do you think money can pay her for what she is enduring at this minute? She's frightened, just as I was fright ened when Bob was born. She's sick and suffering. But do you think all our dollars could buy that child from her? Money has made us hard, Hanni bal; let's be different." "I'm afraid we have put it off too long." he answered, slowly. "She won't forgive us, and I'm not sure I want her to." "Bob's in trouble. Won't you go to him?" Hannibal Wharton opened his lips, closed them; then, taking his hat and coat, he left the room. But as the old man went uptown his nerve failed him. He was fixed in his ways, he had a blind faith in his own infallibility. Twice he rode up in the elevator to his son's door, twice he rode down again. Hannibal settled himself to wait. During the chill, still hours after the city had gone to rest an automobile drewvup to the apartment house; when its expected passenger emerged from the building a grim-faced stranger in a greatcoat accosted him. One glance challenged the physician's attention, and he answered: "Yes, it's all over. A boy." "And Mrs. Wharton, the mother?" "Youth is a wonderful thing, and she has everything to live for. She is doing as well as could be expected. You're a relative, I presume?" The old man hesitated, then his voice came boldly. "Yes, I'm her fa ther." When the doctor had driven away Hannibal strode into the building and telephoned to the Waldorf, but now his words were short and oddly broken. Nevertheless they brought a light of gladness to the eyes of the woman who had waited all these hours. CHAPTER XXVI. Adoree Demorest, still In her glitter ing, hybrid costume, but heavy-limbed and dull with fatigue, paused outside her own door early that morning. The time lacked perhaps an hour of dawn, the street outside and the building itself was silent, yet from Adoree's parlor issued the sound of light fingers upon piano keys. Adoree entered, to find Campbell Pope, with collar loos ened and hair on end, seated at the in strument. The air within the room BLOCK Author of "The Iron Trail" "The Spoilers" " The Silver Horde" Etc. Cefijrighl, By Harptr tg Brtiiirl was blue and reeking with the odor of stale tobacco smoke,, and the ash receiver at his elbow wa3 piled high with burnt offerings. Pope rose at Adoree's entrance, eying her anxiously. "Is everything all right?" he, cried. "Is what all right?" "The er Lorelie." "Oh, yes! What are you doing here?" "I suppose I must apologize. You see, I came here to wait and and help." "You decided to help?" Adoree eyed the disheveled musician queerly. "You've helped to break my lease I'll be thrown out of this house sure." Pope stammered, guiltily. "I was playing for Bob and Lorelei." With one glove half off. Adoree slow ly seated herself, showing In her face an amazement that increased the man's embarrassment. Pope took a deeper breath, then burst out: "Oh, I have a sixty-horse power Imagination, and it seems to me that music i3 a sort of prayer; anyhow, It's the only way I know of praying. Good music Is divine language. In my own way I was sort of praying for those two children. Foolish, isn't it? I'm sorry I toid you. It sounds nutty to me when I stop to consider it." Pope stirred uneasily under Adoree's gravely speculative eyes. "Lorelei's all right?" Adoree nodded. "It's a boy." There was a moment of silence. "Did you ever see a brand-new baby?" "Murder, no!" Miss Demorest's gaze remained bent upon Pope, but it was focused upon great distances; her voice when she spoke was hushed and awe-stricken. "Neither did I until this one. I held it! I held it in my arms. Oh I was fright ened, and yet I seemed to know just what to do and and everything. It was strange. It hurt me terribly, for. you see, I didn't know what babies meant until tonight. Now I know." Pope saw the shining eyes suddenly fill and threaten to overflow; instead of the grotesquely overdressed and ar tificial stage favorite he beheld only a yearning woman whose face was sof tened and glorified as by a vision. "I didn't know you cared for chil dren." Adoree shrugged; the beads at her throat clicked barbarously. "Neither did I, but I suppose every woman does if she only knew it. Tonight I began to understand what this ache inside of me means." Her gaze came back and centered upon his face, but it was frightened and panic-stricken. "I've sacrificed my right to children." "How can you say " "Oh. you know it as well as I do!" A flush wavered in .the speaker's cheeks, then fled, leaving her white and weary. "You, of all men, must under stand. I'm notorious. I'm a painted woman, a wicked woman the wicked est woman in the land and that repu tation will live in spite of auything I can do." She began to cry now in a way strange to Pope's experience. Pope's habitual restraint all at once gave way. ".Nonsense: he exploded. "The thing that counts is what you are, not what you seem to be. I know the truth." Now there was nothing sufficiently significant about these words to bring a light of wonderment and gladness to the girl's face, but her tears ceased as abruptly as they had commenced, and noting the slowly growing radiance of her expression. Campbell was stricken dumb with fright at the possible conse quences of temerity. The knowledge of his shortcomings robbed him of con fidence and helped to confuse him. Adoree rose. For a moment she stood looking at him with a peculiar, tender smile, then took him by the lapels of his shapeless coat and drew his thin face down to hers. "I'm not going to let you back out," she declared, firmly. "You asked me, didn't you?" "Adoree! No, no! Think what you are doing," die cried, sharply. But she continued to smile up Into his eyes with a gladness that intoxi cated him. m She snuggled closer to him, murmur ing, cozily: "I don't want to think we'll have plenty of time to think when we're too old to talk. Now, I just want to love you as hard as you have been loving me for the last six months." , To all young fathers there comes a certain readjustment of values. To P.ob, who had always led a sellish, thoughtless existence, it was at first bewildering to discover that his place at the head of his household had been usurped by another. Heretofore he had always been of supreme domestic im portance, but now the order of things was completely reversed, if not hope lessly jumbled. First in consequence came this new person, tiny and vastly tyrannical because of its helplessness, then the nurse, an awesome person a sort of oracle and regent combined who ruled in the name and stead of the new heir. Lorelei herself occupied no mean station in the new scheme, for at least she shared the confidence of the nurse and the doctor, and ranked above the cook and the housemaid, but not so Bob. Somewhere at the foot of i the list h fouud his cvn true place. Now, strange to say. this novel ar rangement was extremely agreeable to the deposed ruler. Bob took a shame- less delight in doing menial .service; to retell rum to carry for all hands filled him with joy. But once outside of the premises lie reasserted himself, and his importance grew as gas expands. Be fore long his intimate friends began to avoid him like a plague. It was his partner, Kurtz, who finally dubbed him "The pestilence that talketh in darkness and the destruction that wasteth our noondays." One day,, after Bob had acquired suf ficient confidence iu himself and in the baby to handle It without anxiety to the nurse, he begged permission to show It to the halhnan downstairs. He returned greatly elated, explaining that the attendant, who had some Im possible number of babies of his own and might therefore be considered an authority, declared this one to be the finest he had ever beheld. Oddly enough, this praise delighted Bob out of all reason. He remained in a state of suppressed excitement ail that day, and on the following afternoon he again kidnaped the child for a second exhibition. It seemed that the infant's fame spread rapidly, for soon the ten ants of neighboring apartments began to clamor for a sight of it, and Bob was only too eager to gratify them. Every afternoon he took his son down stairs with him, until finally Lorelei checked him as he was going out. "Bob, dear," she said, with the faint est shadow of a smile. "I don't think it's good for him to go out so often. Why don't you ask your father and mother to come up?" Wharton flushed, then he stam mered, "I what makes you er think" "Why, I guessed it the very first day." Lorelei's smile saddened. "They needn't see me, you know." Bob laid the child back in its bed. "But that's just what they want. They want to see you, only I wouldn't let you be bothered. They're perfectly foolish over the kid; mother cries, and father but just wait." He rushed out of the room, and in a few moments re turned with his parents. Hannibal Wharton was deeply em barrassed, but his wife went straight to Lorelei and, bending over her chair, placed a kiss upon her lips. "There," said she. "When you are stronger I'm going to apologize for the way we've treated you. We're old people. We're selfish and suspicious and unreason able, but we're not entirely inhuman. You won't be too hard on us. will you?" The old lady's eyes were shining, the palms which were clasped over Lore lei's hand were hot and tremulous. The look of hungry yearning that greeted the elder woman's words was ample answer, and with a little choking cry she gathered the weak figure into her arms and thrilled as she felt the amber head upon her breast. Hannibal trumpeted into his hand kerchief, then cleared his throat pre monitorily, but Bob forestalled him with a happy laugh. "Don't hold any post-mortems, dad. Lorelei ' knows everything you intend to say." ' "I'm blamed if she does," rumbled, the old man, "because I don't know mjself. I'm not much on apologies; I can take 'em, but I can't make 'em." His voice rose -sternly: "Young lady. the night that baby was born I stooil outside this hoTTse for hours because was afraid to come in. And my fee hurt like the devil, too. I wouldn't lose that much sleep for the whole steel trust; but I didn't dare go back to the hotel, for mother was waiting, and I was afraid of her, too. I don't intend to go through another night like that." "You Won't Be Too Hard on Us, Will You?" Bob's mother turned to her son, say-1 ing: "Sue I ueautirui, ana sue is good, too. Anybody can see that. We could love her for what she has done for you, if for nothing else." "Well. I should say so," proudly vaunted the son. "She took a chance when she didn't care for me. and she made me into a regular fellow. Why. she reformed me from the ground up. I've sworn off every blessed thing I used to do." "Including drinking?" grufily queried the father. "Yes." Lorelel smiled her slow. reluctar smile at the visitors, and her voice tf gentle as she said: "He thinks he t it's hard to stop entirely, ansf I mustn't blame him if he forget self occasionally. You see, drinking is mostly a matter of temperament, after all. But he is doing splendidly, and some day perhaps " They nodded understandingly. "You'll try to like us, won't you, for Bob's sake?" pleaded the old lady, timidly. "I intend to love you both very dear ly." shyly returned the girl, and. noting the light in Lorelei's face, Bob Whar ton was satisfied. Restraint vanished swift'r nndor the old couple's evident determination to make amends, huj after they had gon Lorelei became so pensive that Bob said, anxiously, "I hope you weren't polite to them merely for my sake." Lorelei shook her head. "No. I was only thinking Do you realize that pone of my own people have been to see me? That I haven't had a single word from any of them?" Bob stirred uncomfortably; he start ed to speak, thee checked himself as she went on, not without some effort' "I'm going to say something unpleas ant, but I think you ought to know It. When they learn that your parents have taken me in and made up with us' they're going to ask me for money. It's a terrible thing to say, but it's true." "Do you want to see them? Do you want them to see the baby?" "N-no!" Lorelei was pale as she made answer. "Not after all that has passed." Bob heaved a grateful sigh. "I'm glad. They wor't trouble you any more." "Why? What-" "I've been wai:lng until you were strong to tell yoi. I've noticed how their silence hur: you, but it's my fault that they bHven't been here. I sent them away." "You sent then? away?" "Yes. I fixed t'tem with money and they're happy at last. There's consid erable to tell. Jim got into trouble with the police and finally sent for me. He told me everything and it wasn't pretty; I'd rather iot repeat all he said, but it opened my eyes and showed me w:hy they brought you here, how they put you on the au .'tion block, and how they cried for bidi . He told me things you know nothh.g about and could never guess. When he had finished I thanked God that they had flung you into my armC instead of some other man's. It's a mirr rle that you weren't sacrificed utterly.' "Where is Jim now?" "Somewhere in the boundless West. He gave me his p jomise to reform." "He never will." "Of course not, md I don't expect it of him. You see, I know how hard it is to reform." "But mother anc. father?" "I'm coning to iiem. My dad came around the day t.fter our baby was born and shook ht nds. He wanted to stamp right in he e and tell you what a fool he had m fle of himself, but I wouldn't stand fir it. Finally, when he saw the kid, Ne blew up entirely, and right away proposed breaking ground for a jaiper palace for the yojster. He v anted to build it in h where he could run in, go- ora business. Mother was yuiirsu, lutr. itch, v urn l uti'i I'ttle understanding with Jim Vd the whole truth about your would be a constant nnnlnoaa unload thAr a for. It struck me that fl ramp tisrht fnr hnnni- . r - - ' ' r uldn't stand for any- at the last minute. I and told her the facts, to und"-stand as well lift fe- in spite of all r an e ido cnient." What dc yOv. mean?" Lorelei faltered in bewild' .rrae it. "We asked him f(r ;i hundred thou sand dollars and rot it." Lorelei gasped. "He bellowed 1 lie a bull, he spat poison like a cobt he writhed like a bucket of eels, be we put it over." "A hundred tho viand dollars!" whis pered the wife. "To a penny. A jd it's in the bank to your credit. But I didn't stop there." Bob's voice hardei d. ' I went to your mother and in yotr name I promised her the income fiom it so long, and only so long, as a'ue and Peter stayed away from you. !'he accepted rather greedily, I thought and they have gone back to Val . They have your old house, and I tave their promise never to see you e?: jept upon your invi tation. Of course jdu can go to them whenever you uish, but they're happy, and I think we will be happier with them in Vale ihan In New York. I hope you don't ob.tect to my arrange ment." There was a lonjt silence, then Lore lei sighed. "You ar a very good man. Bob. It was my dream to do some thing of this sort, but I could never have done It so well." ner husband bml and kissed her tenderly. "It wasn't all my doings; I had help. And you mustn't feel sad. lor something tellu nue you're going to learn finally the m aning ox' a real . . , . ... , "m-fe'-' T, e answer came dreamily, then as a fretful complaint issued trom tiie c fi at ner siae L.ore- lei leaned forwar! sud swiftly gath ered the baby into lie f arms. "Is he sick?" VSc questioned, la alarm. "No, silly. He's '.u) t huiigry." There in the csxth iring: dusk Bob Wharton looked to at a sitit that never failed to thrfll him strangely. In his wife's face w3 a beautiful con- and lt seenje 10 011,1 fittiDg in- jat this cointty g!rl who had M"V city ir rieiit of life should tb-, Itl a baby t I'll x irar l f r r t i i-y rv 1 1 r n ft "4 1 Vr l V J 1 iL r --1
The Roanoke Beacon and Washington County News (Plymouth, N.C.)
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Feb. 1, 1917, edition 1
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